This Week’s New and Rare Items at Miskatonic Books

This week we have some very cool new and interesting items. Please keep in mind that many of these items we only have one copy of so these will go on a first come first serve basis.

To get more information or to reserve your copy just click the cover art.

 

HANNES BOK: A Life In Illustrations (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

With over 450 pages, and a large, 8 × 12 size, this collection covers the entire artistic career of Hannes Bok. Painstakingly edited by Joseph Wrzos, with essays and memoirs on Bok by Ray Bradbury, Stephen Fabian, and many others, this book features over 600 illustrations. Many come from the pulps and pulp covers. Our color section features all of Bok’s known dustjackets and the largest collection of Bok paintings ever published, including many works that have never before been printed. Key works also feature detail views. Printed on heavy paper, with printed cloth panels, ribbon markers, and a printed cloth slipcase, the edition is limited to 200 copies for sale and is signed by most contributors. The book is printed using stochastic screening with five inks, resulting in unparalleled clarity and color reproduction.

This the signed and slipcased edition, which is limited to just 200 copies for sale, it is signed by Joseph Wrzos, Stephen Fabian, Bob Eggleton, Jill Bauman, Jason Eckhardt and Stephen Hickman. There are also signatures by Ray Bradbury and Hannes Bok, but these are facsimile, or printed, signatures. It is nice to have a Bok signature, and you will understand that due to his age and health, Mr Bradbury was just not able to sign. Centipede Press.

 

SIXTEEN SUCKING STORIES (Original Art) by Alan M. Clark

This is the original painting by Alan M. Clark for Sixteen Sucking Stories by Brian Lumley. The art is 8 x 12 and is framed and matted.

This product must be shipped by priority mail.

 

THE EVERLASTING by Tim Lebbon (Signed Lettered Edition Hardcover in Metal Traycase)

26 Lettered deluxe hardcovers with a metal traycase signed by Tim Lebbon and Caniglia.

(This is letter “B” and will contain a Giclee print from Caniglia. Only the lettered edition will have these prints. No more will ever be made.)

Book and traycase are in new, unread condition.

30 years ago…

Sixteen-year-old Scott sees his first ghost.

Where is the Chord of Souls? it demands, then abruptly flees, leaving the horror of that fateful day indelibly tattooed on his Scott’s young mind.

He will never forget that day. Because the ghost was his grandfather’s friend . . . and his grandfather had murdered his friend just ten days before.

Now…

Thirty years after his grandfather’s suicide, Scott is stunned to suddenly receive a letter from the old man which talks of an ancient book of apocalyptic power: The Chord of Souls.

The letter’s arrival quickly heralds a deluge of supernatural events that has Scott teetering on the precipice of sanity and salvation: his wife is kidnapped, ghosts besiege his home and his mind, and immortality dons the guise of a beautiful woman. . .

Scott embarks upon a perilous journey to save his wife, one fraught with horrific danger and soul-shattering temptation. After all, who would not be tempted by the promise of powers beyond understanding . . . knowledge beyond comprehension . . . and life everlasting?

 

 

Supernatural Literature of the World [3 Volumes]: An Encyclopedia by S. T. Joshi & Stefan F. Dziemianowicz

Read widely and studied at all levels, supernatural literature is one of the most significant and enduring types of writing. Comprehensive in scope, this encyclopedia provides thorough coverage of literature of the supernatural. The most exhaustive work of its kind, it includes entries on authors, works, and numerous topics, including alien abduction, drama, ghouls, and Latin literature. Entries draw on current scholarship, with special attention to recent writers.

The literature of the supernatural has had a distinguished history over the past two centuries, while the incorporation of the supernatural in literary works can be traced back as far as classical antiquity. Such prominent writers as Edith Wharton and Henry James made use of the supernatural in their writings, and numerous contemporary writers continue to do so. Supernatural literature is widely enjoyed by high school students and general readers, and scholars are devoting more and more attention to it. This encyclopedia provides thorough coverage of the literature of the supernatural.

The most exhaustive work of its kind, it covers authors and works from the ancient world to the present. Two of the world’s foremost authorities on supernatural literature have coordinated a team of internationally recognized contributors, including: Mike Ashley, Benjamin F. Fisher, Paula Guran, Stephen Jones, Darrell Schweitzer, and Brian Stableford.

While other references chiefly offer biographical and critical information, this encyclopedia also provides entries on numerous special topics, including: Alien Abduction, Curses, Dreams and Nightmares, Fantasy Tales, Feminism, Hinduism, Islam, Munsey Magazines, Occultism, Southern Gothic, Urban Legends, Voodoo, Werewolves, and many more.

The set includes roughly 1,000 alphabetically arranged entries and presents the work of some 70 contributors. It provides entries on such major canonical writers as Charles Dickens, William Shakespeare, and Oscar Wilde, while also devoting attention to Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, R. L. Stine, and other popular contemporary writers. Entries also include special topics and cultural traditions in the genre. Entries cite works for further reading, and the encyclopedia closes with a selected, general bibliography of major works on supernatural literature.

Supernatural literature figures prominently in the curriculum, and students are often interested in reading such works on their own. This encyclopedia is an essential tool for student research on supernatural literature and world literary traditions, and is equally valuable for teachers planning related courses. Both school and public libraries need this work to support the interests of general readers.

 

HUNTING ZOE by Steve Gerlach (Signed Lettered Edition Hardcover)

 

This is one of only 26 signed leather bound lettered edition in custom silk bound traycase.

She’s beautiful. She’s sexy. And she’s very dangerous…

They cracked the code, and were on the road to their destiny…

Glen and Mark know the story behind Zoe. The real story. They’ve figured it out, they’ve done the research, they’ve found all the clues.

They’re on the hunt—the hunt for Zoe.

Glen knows he’s right. He knows she’s waiting out there for him.

Nothing will stop him. No one will get in his way. He’ll be the first…

But will he be the last?

The hunt is on.

Because Legends Never Die…

HUNTING ZOE

Seek and ye shall find. Legends Never Die…

Table of Contents:

When Fantasy Met Reality (introduction by Brett McBean)
Hunting Zoe
Broken Cookie (short story)
Schism (short story)
CellCaNdy (short story)
Dead of Night (German version, first English release short story)
Jungle (short story, first time printing)
Steve Gerlach On The Edge (FULL and UPDATED Gerlach interview with Ron Clinton)

Hunting Zoe is an entirely new spin on the idea of a “sequel”. Set in the real life world, where Love Lies Dying is a work of fiction, Hunting Zoe blurs the lines between reality and fiction.

“With Hunting Zoe, Steve Gerlach moves into full throttle. Intense and gripping–don’t plan on doing anything else once you start reading this one. Gerlach is a master storyteller, and he is in high form. If you liked Love Lies Dying, you’ll love Hunting Zoe.” —Brian Keene, author of The Rising, Terminal and Fear of Gravity.

 

This Week’s New Items At Miskatonic Books!

Just click on any of the cover art below to get more information on the book or to reserve your copy.

MOTHERLESS CHILD by Glen Hirshberg (Signed Limited Edition Hardcover)

Another vampire novel? Really?

How about a vampire novel about single motherhood? And Otis Redding? And best friends? And how you choose whom you kill? And what that costs? And whether there’s ever a way back?

On a rare night out in Charlotte, North Carolina, Natalie and Sophie — best friends, single moms, music lovers — meet the Whistler at the Back Way Out. In the aftermath of that encounter, desperate to save their children and, just maybe, themselves, they flee together down the back roads of the Deep South, pursued by guilt, the Whistler and his Mother, and their own growing, terrible hunger.

Bloody, sexy, rollicking, and sad, Motherless Child is a road novel about finding a way back to a home that no longer exists, a paean to music that drives us out of ourselves, a howling joyride toward heartbreak, and just maybe the vampire novel you really haven’t yet read: the human one.

One of only 500 signed and numbered hardcover copies. Book is in new unread condition.

DARK DELICACIES: ORIGINAL TALES OF TERROR AND THE MACABRE with Ray Bradbury, Clive Barker, Richard Matheson and many more (Signed Deluxe Edition In Custom Traycase)

Traycased Lettered Edition of 52 signed and lettered copies bound in leather with a satin ribbon page marker and additional artwork. Signed by many of the contributors see picture of signature sheet by clicking the image tab below.

Edited by Del Howison and Jeff Gelb, Dark Delicacies is an anthology of original horror stories by some of the top writers in the genre, including Clive Barker, Ray Bradbury, Ramsey Campbell, John Farris, William F. Nolan, Richard Laymon, Whitley Strieber, F. Paul Wilson, Brian Lumley, and many others! Featuring artwork by more than a dozen artists — including a full color cover by Jill Bauman — this oversized, slipcased, and signed deluxe edition will be a fantastic addition to your collection!

cover artwork by: Jill Bauman

interior artwork by: Alan M. Clark, Keith Minnion, Glenn Chadbourne, Allen Koszowski, Jill Bauman, Erik Wilson, Russell Dickerson, gak, Will Renfro, Alex McVey, Vincent Chong, Steve Gilberts, and Chad Savage.

The Table of Contents:
Richard Matheson (foreword)
Clive Barker
Ray Bradbury
Ramsey Campbell
John Farris
Nancy Holder
Roberta Lannes
Richard Laymon
Brian Lumley
Lisa Morton
Steve Niles
William F. Nolan
Rick Pickman
Robert Steven Rhine
David J. Schow
D. Lynn Smith
Whitley Strieber
F. Paul Wilson
Gahan Wilson
Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

 

FOUNDATION LETTERS AND TEACHINGS by Brother XII (Edward Arthur Wilson) Limited Edition Hardcover

Foundation Letters and Teachings is the principle published work of Edward Arthur Wilson (1878-1934), the English occultist more widely known as Brother XII. As the self-proclaimed “Messenger of the Masters” and successor to Madame Blavatsky, Wilson founded the Aquarian Foundation, an organization which attracted thousands of followers in the latter part of the 1920s and early 1930s, a number of whom moved to the headquarters of his alternative community on Vancouver Island, British Columbia.

Though his rise to prominence was spectacular, Brother XII’s fall from grace was equally rapid, and the Aquarian Foundation fell apart amidst a series of sensational court cases featuring charges of financial misconduct and allegations of free love. Despite the breakup of his original colony, Brother XII continued his occult work on a group of nearby islands in the Strait of Georgia, where he and his mistress, a sinister practitioner of ritual magic named Madame Z, subjected his disciples to the most extreme physical hardships, ostensibly for the purpose of furthering their spiritual development. This so-called City of Refuge collapsed in 1932 when a group of disciples revolted against the mistreatment and subsequently brought legal actions against their former leader for the return of the monies they had contributed to him. In the aftermath, Brother XII and his paramour wrecked the settlement and fled with a fortune in gold, leaving a legacy of bitterness and broken dreams, and a legend that endures to this day.

Brother XII was regarded by his adherents as a mystic and a magus, a man with genuine spiritual and occult gifts. In one celebrated incident, he is said to have reduced court proceedings to a shambles when he used his “powers” to paralyze the chief witness against him and to disable the opposing attorney, even toppling a row of spectators in the gallery. A complex, contradictory individual, Brother XII tested his disciples to the limit, though his increasingly irrational behavior led many to believe that he had succumbed to the perils that beset the path of Initiation.

Originally published in 1927, Foundation Letters and Teachings is a collection of Brother XII’s writings, including eighteen early letters, seven articles that lay out the fundamentals of his Teachings, and five periodical articles, four of which appeared in The Occult Review in 1926, and generated enormous comment and controversy. Though the book was primarily intended for a Theosophical audience, its contents have a broader reach, and present Brother XII as a legitimate and determined spiritual teacher. This Teitan Press edition of Foundation Letters and Teachings is the first reprint of this rare work and includes the full text of the first edition, corrected and reset, together with a comprehensive Foreword by John Oliphant, Brother XII’s biographer and the foremost authority on his life.

Limited to only 500 copies, book is in new, unread condition

 

R.I.P Ray Bradbury (1920 – 2012)

Miskatonic Books would like to give our condolences to the family and friends of one of the most amazing authors of our time, Ray Bradbury.

Bradbury with 27 novels and over 600 short stories was a prolific writer and is most widely known for his dystopian classic “Fahrenheit 451,” released in 1953, but he also wrote the widely read “The Martian Chronicles” and “Something Wicked This Way Comes.”

President Obama gave a statement on Bradbury:

“For many Americans, the news of Ray Bradbury’s death immediately brought to mind images from his work, imprinted in our minds, often from a young age.  His gift for storytelling reshaped our culture and expanded our world.  But Ray also understood that our imaginations could be used as a tool for better understanding, a vehicle for change, and an expression of our most cherished values.  There is no doubt that Ray will continue to inspire many more generations with his writing, and our thoughts and prayers are with his family and friends.”

Today we have lost a hero of fantastic fiction, but thankfully, he has left us a vast library of his profound work to ponder and enjoy for many generations to come.

The world will miss you Mr. Bradbury.

 

Isaac Asimov Wanted to be An Historian!

In a March 1991 * article, Isaac Asimov made some very personal revelations. He begins simply, “When I was going to college, the United States was not yet out of the Great Depression … I was not going to get a job after I graduated in 1939. The only thing I could do was to go on to graduate work, obtain some advanced degrees, and hope …”

There are millions of 20-somethings today who have the same concerns as Asimov did over 70 years ago.

However, we read on, “…what subject …? I was hung up between history and chemistry. I thought I could handle either one, but there was no question in my mind that I was more interested in history.”

This point blank shocker must have made 1991 readers drop their magazine. The grand master of science fiction, and the master of explaining science to the masses wanted to be an historian? It gets more interesting.

“If I get my degree in history, then the chances are … I will get {a job} in some small college away from my beloved city of New York. … if … in chemistry … with a large research firm for an ample salary …”. The choice was made on purely pragmatic grounds. “I obtained my Ph.D. In chemistry in 1948.” He had a long delay due to WWII.

In 1949, the job he found was, ironically, at a small college away from New York at a very small salary. “Chemistry was a big flop … I didn’t like it and I was no good at it …”.

Another stunner! The great Asimov was not a good scientist? So, how did he get from the dregs of 1950 to being the notable Asimov?

“… in 1958 I was fired … by that time I had another career, that of writing … Becoming a professional writer was a third option {in college} but one that I didn’t consider for even a split-second. By the time {1949} I had begun work at the medical school, I had written 68 stories and sold 60 … my total earnings for all eleven years amounted to $7700 …”.

That was not an insignificant sum in the 1950′s, but not enough to be a full-time writer. Asimov had written a novel, and added to this, so, “…in 1958, my literary earnings amounted to only $15,000 a year, enough to keep me going … by that time I had a wife and two children …”.

Asimov made a bold choice. He decided to do what he loved the best – history. HE estimated that it would take three years of research to write a “three musketeers historical fiction novel” and little prospect of it selling well. After consulting with John W. Campbell, Jr., he decided to write science fiction historical fiction novels. Few had thought of that idea, at the time, so he began to write what would become his Foundation novels, later expanding to his Robot novels. Their popularity can scarcely be exaggerated for their time, and they allowed Asimov to essentially write anything he wanted, anytime he wanted, and make money from that time forward.

Asimov had tinkered with this idea in Astounding Tales writing eight stories between 1842 and 1950. In 1951, he published Foundation with Gnome Press. Gnome then reprinted Asimov’s original stories in two more volumes (1952, 1953) cementing his legacy and winning a 1966 Hugo award for best all-time series. [Young Lin Carter was notably influenced by this series].

Asimov circa 1965

Asimov influenced countless story writers including Gene Roddenberry (The Federation of Star Trek), and Asimov (in print) speculated on George Lucas’ Star Wars features and the possibility that the writers and producers used his novels. There is no question that Forbidden Planet‘s (1955) Robbie the Robot follows Asimov’s laws of robotics. Asimov had a 1940 story named “Robbie”, but the writer of Doc Savage (1935) predated the use of the name “Robbie the Robot”.

The iconic Asimov, later in life, as we remember him.

History will have a difficult time deciding whether Asimov, Ray Bradbury, or Robert Heinlein impacted mid-20th century culture the greatest, but Asimov – who died too soon in 1992 – is greatly missed by his many fans. He who longed to be an historian ended up making history.

* Fantasy and Science Fiction, “All Four Stanzas”, March 1991, p. 133ff. Asimov had a decades long monthly column, usually on one aspect of applied science or another, but very frequently on an historical subject such as this one: Francis Scott Key’s The Star Spangled Banner.

Two Rays and a Godzilla

A funny thing happened on the way to the movies … um, well that’s an old joke introduction, but in this case very true.

It goes back to the early 20th century when some boys – Hannes Bok, Ray Harryhausen, Ray Bradbury, Robert Heinlein, and Forest J. Ackerman were off-and-on members of the Los Angeles Scientifiction Club. One day, a movie came along called King Kong. The boys had never seen anything like it, and they had seen plenty, and conjured up weird and wild in their own imaginations, but Merian C. Cooper’s creation given life by Willis O’Brien struck them to their core.

Well, Ray Bradbury could not be contained – not that he wasn’t already a ball of fanaticism – and began to write with a new freedom. Ray Harryhausen set out to master what he’d seen Willis do on screen. For a while these two men had separate careers, with Harryhausen eventually capturing the attention of Willis O’Brien and working on M

ighty Joe Young. Harryhausen went on the create a new style of stop-action animation creating his own jaw-dropping effects.

One day, Harryhausen and Bradbury were entertaining executives working on a new movie that would use Harryhausen’s animation. They were keen on getting Bradbury* to give them – probably free – advice. Bradbury took the script, paged through it, and was stunned.

It was his story.

He wrote The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms and placed it in the Saturday Evening Post (23 June 1951) – then a veritable stalwart in American homes – and undoubtedly the script writers had purloined and expanded upon the story hoping not to be caught. The executives quickly made arrangements to pay Bradbury thus securing his story, his help, and getting extra publicity from his famous name.

The movie later helped the two Rays come full circle from their love of dinosaurs, horror, and science-fiction adventure, and in their own way paying a temporary homage to Kong as their monster began to crush, kill, and maim New York.

Many others have also followed suit, including the original Godzilla (with Tokyo a stand -in for NYC).

Oh and one more little item. A certain 2008 movie with jerky camera action seems awfully similar to this previous movie-beastie …

_____

Original “20,000″ trailer with a lot of Cold War rhetoric mixed into it. Note the oblique reference to Bradbury’s story in typeface in part of the trailer.

Updated for the 21st centruy, and using CGI rather than Dynamation, it still follows a rather close format in methodically destroying New York and ating people.

*… of course one always has to take a Ray Bradbury anecdote with a grain of salt.

Very Rare New Arrivals and The Century’s Best

We have some very rare new arrivals and a must have new pre-order at Miskatonic Books!

To reserve or get more information on any of the titles below just click on the cover art.

The Century’s Best Horror Fiction
edited by John Pelan

About the Books:
Cemetery Dance Publications commissioned a spectacular two-volume anthology project under the editorship of noted author and historian of the horror genre, John Pelan.

John selected one story published during each year of the 20th Century (1901-2000) as the most notable story of that year — all 100 stories were then collected in this amazing two volume set to be published as The Century’s Best Horror Fiction.

The ground rules were simple: Only one selection per author. Only one selection per year.

Two huge volumes, one hundred authors, one hundred classic stories, more than 700,000 words of fiction — history in the making!

Trade Edition hardcovers bound in full-cloth and Smyth sewn with a full color dust jacket — two deluxe volumes

 

NERO by Clark Ashton Smith and Signed, Hand Written Postcard by H. P. Lovecraft to Clark Ashton Smith

This letterpress chapbook was published by Roy A. Squires in 1964. This copy also comes with a hand written signed post card by H. P. Lovecaft 1933. This copy is still in its original publisher’s envelope and comes with a typed letter from the publisher The postcard also mentions occultist Aleister Crowley! Book Condition: Fine. Limited Edition. One of 450 copies bound in stiff salmon colored wrappers on handmade paper. Chapbook is in fine condition. .According to Chalker only 381 copies were actually printed.; 12mo – over 6¾” – 7¾” tall.

 

 

FROM THE CRYPTS OF MEMORY by Clark Ashton Smith (Limited Edition Letterpress)

Clark Ashton Smith. From the Crypts of Memory. [Glendale: Roy A. Squires], 1973. First edition limited to 198 copies hand-numbered on a limitation page at back. Color illustration by the author tipped-in. Folio. Unpaginated.Sewn brown wraps with textured glassine cover with titles in brown. Handmade paper, untrimmed edges.

This is number 21 of 198

Book is in fine condition in near fine printed envelope

 

 

 

THE DIVERSIFIER with Fritz Leiber, Manly Wade Wellman, Robert Bloch and more (May 1977 Digest)

Book Description: C.C. Clingan, Oroville, CA, U.S.A., 1977. Soft cover.

Book Condition: Near Fine.

Gary Kato (illustrator). 1st Edition. 8vo – over 7¾ – 9¾” tall. The best issue of this generally excellent small press periodical.

Fiction by Robert E. Howard (“Sea Curse”), Isaac Asimov (“Eyes Do More Than See”), Robert Bloch (“Slave of the Flames”), Gregory Nicholl (“The Man Who Collected Lovecraft”–a must read for HPL fans), Dean Wesley Smith (“Frankenstein Love”), Phillip C. Heath (“Beneath the Vaults of Sumarus”), and Brenda Watkinson (“Jasper’s Hollow”). Poetry by Hannes Bok (with a photo of Bok), Edith Ogutsch, G. Sutton Breiding (Rhysling Award-winning poet), Marc Laidlaw, and Michael Kellar. Articles include Manly Wade Wellman on H.P. Lovecraft, E. Hoffmann Price on Edmond Hamilton, Fritz Leiber on Weird Tales, and Billy Wolfenbarger on Weird Tales. Guest editorial by Robert Weinberg. Reviews by Gordon Linzner and Arthur Rahman. Art by Gary Kato (cover & full-page interior illos), Allen Koszowski, Joseph A. West, Cliff Kurowski, Mark Gelotte, A.B. Cox, Rick Harrison, Craig Anderson, Stephen Riley, and Harry O. Morris.

 

WHAT THE MOON BRINGS by H. P. Lovecraft (Limited Edition Letterpress)

Published in 1970 by letterpress publisher Roy A. Squires

Limited to 125 copies this being number 87

Printed on custom made paper and hand bound in aqua blue custom wraps in printed envelope.

Book is in fine condition in a near fine envelope. Envelope has “HPL Prose Poem #87″ neatly written on the bottom back flap in neat print else fine

 

 

 

The “Value” of Old Magazines

Cast-offs. Read and discarded. That’s what pulps and newsstand magazines were considered.

Yet to a certain group of people, they are Aladdin’s lamp or pirate’s treasure chests buried in the sand.  Lin Carter’s life was changed when as a little boy he found a closet full of old pulp castoffs.  H. P. Lovecraft went to school, met two boys named Munroe, and he was introduced to pulps for the first time. At this writer’s local Half-Price bookstores (a chain of used bookstores originating out of Texas), there are often found 50 cent copies of ancient science fiction magazines and while some of the fiction does not hold up – one does find writers who were once up -and-comers and who got their start there. Unknowns such as Ray Bradbury, or Richard Matheson, or Harlan Ellison.

In the October 1973 Analog P. Schuyler Miller (1912-1974) had a small “column” in which he digressed into a little history. Before there were internet forums and blogs, there were “letters to the editor”. No one knew, but he was only mere months from shuffling from this mortal coil, but his memory was still vivid. The then-publication of Mirage’s “Planets and Dimensions” accumulating arcana of Clark Ashton Smith (1893-1961) included the fire-fight between Smith and Miller in the letter columns of Wonder Stories.

He relates, “…two of [Mirage's] best items are excerpts from a ‘debate’ Clark Ashton Smith, an established poet and author, carried on in the letter columns of Wonder Stories with a twenty-year-old-me. At twenty, I was valiantly espousing an overdue “new wave” that would bring the values of mainstream writing (Victorian mainstream writing, I guess) to fantasy and science fiction. Smith defended the old values, as I do now. He felt fantasy gave a writer more elbow-room (a term he would never have used, but I can’t find the one he did use) than stories tied to the known and limited.”

Upon that statement, and after four decades or so, perhaps the deceased Smith won the argument with Miller. If the Fates are kind, Miller and Smith are still debating with Ackerman and Lovecraft in some writer’s heaven. If not, we can imagine such things, because we still have the fantasy genre alive with us.

Ray Bradbury’s That Son of Richard III

Classic Bradbury Holding a Cat

Ray Bradbury is not just a writer, he is our national treasure. While he started out joking around with Forest J Ackerman in Los Angeles, and embraced that new scientifiction craze in the 1930′s and 1940′s, everyone immediately knew that bundle of energy could never be contained in a “genre”. Yes, in the late 1940′s he got pegged as “that Martian guy”, but oh, he has been so much more.

He’s written poems, nostalgia, humor, horror, futuristic fantasy, but it’s all rooted in our real world, and always done with a warm heart.

If you are a collector of both Bradbury and Roy Squires, this is one you can’t miss. There were only 400 of these lovingly made by Roy for a poem Ray did for him back in 1974. There seems to be no evidence this has appeared elsewhere. And this is copy NUMBER 21 !!

For more details click on the image of the item below.

Hannes Bok: Ground-Breaking Artist

In the early days of horror, weird tales, and scientifiction fans across the country (U.S.A.) used the postal service like we do the internet or texting.  It was a seemingly smaller world then, but one still had to “network” and exhibit a passion to achieve success.  From that early world came a simple Midwesterner, Wayne Woodard (July 2, 1914–April 11, 1964).

He was not to be Wayne for long.  Maybe because his world was a rough and struggle, he began to explore new mental vistas, and even new names for himself.  He bounced around, gave up contacts with family members, but found a new family in the fan community.  Perhaps that is not so different than many of you reading this blog post today?

A typical vibrant illustration by Bok

Moving (1937) to the then small Los Angeles, he met folks like Ray Bradbury, Forest Ackerman, and Ray Harryhausen who had formed a loose group of fans wanting to either write for a living, or make a small splash in the motion picture industry.  They loved weird and horrific fantasy, and for a while Wayne hung out with them.  Then in 1938 he moved to Seattle and corresponded with folks like Max Parrish.  Not much was happening, so he dabbled in astrology, and being a fan of Bach, toyed with a pseudonym.  At first he liked “Hans Bok” after Johann Bach, and then fancied it to Hannes Bok.

Ray Bradbury seized a stash of Bok’s artwork, and in a typical bundle of bravado and coiled-up energy burst across the country to New York brandishing his pal’s work at the first World’s Science Fiction convention.  There, A-type personalities collided for the first time in person, and deals were made.  One was to get Bok noticed, and eventually got him illustrating jobs.

From a mid-20th century "pro-zine" Fanscient.

Some do not know that Bok was also a writer.  He submitted many essays, and perhaps one crowning achievement was to finish an A. Merritt story in illustrated book form- The Fox Woman/Blue Pagoda.

So, today, we celebrate another “hero of the faith”, the great illustrator, Hannes Bok.  If you liked his work, please post a comment and tell your friends.

Ray Bradbury Parodies Lovecraft (1950)

Even die hard Lovecraft and Bradbury fans do not know this trivia.

Winter-Spring 1950

Way back in the late 1940′s, Anthony Boucher (of Sherlock Holmes Radio Dramas fame) was selected as editor of a reprint and sometimes original fantasy fiction.  It had a simple title, Fantasy and Science Fiction.  It would be a quarterly magazine.  Would it make it?  Who knew.  It was small, like the new TV Guide format, and sort of like the venerable Reader’s Digest.  Nothing at all like most pulps.  It was a real chance.  As everyone knows, it did just fine and is still going strong.

In the late 1940′s, Ray Bradbury got to be known as that “Martian Guy”, so much so that he was slated to put together a lot of his short stories and some new items into a “Martian Chronicles”.  He tried out one of these excerpts in Derleth’s Arkham Sampler, and did one for MacClean‘s magazine.   Boucher asked for a reprint, but Bradbury was never satisfied.  He tinkered with the little story, and added a new wrinkle.  He added H. P. Lovecraft as a character.  Thinking twice about it, he quickly yanked that section in every other subsequent version of that pericope.  It vanished.

Only legendary figures such as Robert Weinberg, or others with keen memories ever spoke of it, and even then in whispered tones in obscure forums.

In the F&SF magazine, the Bradbury story had his characters dash about the Martian landsape and into odd rooms here and there.  In one room was H. P. Lovecraft eating ice cream before a raging fire complaining about how cold he was.   It was only about 600 words.

Bradbury never met Lovecraft, of course.  It appears he extracted his details, and exagerated them to hyperbole, from a 1944 Donald Wandrei memorial, “The Dweller In Darkness”, under the Arkham House imprint in the book Marginalia.   Virtually all of the eccentric behavior exhibited by Lovecraft in Wandrei’s remembrance is paralleled by Bradbury.

Here is a very brief excerpt that shows the wit and style of that early Mr. Bradbury.

“I am writing a letter to Mr. L. Frank Baum, I am quite sure that we shall enjoy a delightful correspondence, once started ….
“But this is his castle, the Emerald City, he lives right downstairs,” said Poe.
“And then I have a letter I must write to Mr. Samuel Johnson, and Mr. Alexander Pope, and Mr. Machen, and Mr. Coppard, and a thousand others. I do not know when I shall finish. But I shall take the time to help you with Mr. Dickens, nevertheless.”
‘‘Will you?’’
“Yes.” Lovecraft dipped his quill. “I shall write him a letter about this crisis.”
“Come on, Edgar,” said Bierce, with a laugh.

Here is a Miskatonic Books salute to Ray Bradbury, America’s National Treasure.